Another way we use to be is to say something exists.
A cat is under the bed. A robot is in the house.

Those sentences LOOK the same in English, but the meaning is different. You can substitute "exists" for "is" in the second type of sentence, but not the first. Or you can rephrase as "there is a cat under the bed" for the second kind of sentence, but not the first.

For that usage, Japanese has two verbs, imasu and arimasu, as has already been explained.

Beddono shitani neko ga imasu. ieno nakani robotto ga arimasu.

HTH!

Shira

"Give me a fruitful error any time, full of seeds, bursting with its own corrections. You can keep your sterile truth for yourself." -- Vilfredo Pareto

Languages are organized a bit like the Crayola product line, the fancier
ones adding colors to the more basic ones. If a language has only two
color words, they are for black and white (usually encompassing dark
and light, respectively). If it has three, they are for black, white, and
red; if four, black, white, red, and either yellow or green. Five adds in
both yellow and green; six, blue; seven, brown; more than seven, purple,
pink, orange, or gray.

（The Language Instinctという本の抜粋です。）

志羅

"Give me a fruitful error any time, full of seeds, bursting with its own corrections. You can keep your sterile truth for yourself." -- Vilfredo Pareto